Monday, May 3, 2010

She was often unsure of what she was doing but this time,she was absolutely clueless.Her family would never allow such a match.It was true that he was intelligent and a good man but even if was the most eligible bachelor in the entire world,they still wouldn't let her marry him.He was,bluntly put,not of their caste.Why was she still clinging on to him?Why could she not bring herself to leave him forever and move on?Is this Love,she thought despairingly and if it was why did it have to be so painful .Why was everything so difficult in life?

He would understand if she left him.He always did.His large black eyes were deep like the ocean and they took everything within.When she raged at him or cried upon his shoulder,his comforting eyes looked into hers and made her warm.Warm with joy,with comfort and with hope.He was always there for her,like a silent rock who had pledged his life to the raging seas,he always stood by her no matter what she said or did.His silent devotion made her cringe.He knew she could never go against her family but still he was there,by her side,comforting and smiling.He was a good man and deserved better,she thought.She tried to fight with him numerous times,trying to distance herself so he wouldn't feel any pain but he was no fool.He always knew her intentions,he knew her bickering was symptomatic of her frustrations;he simply knew everything.He knew her completely.Both of them were hopelessly in love.Both knew the outcome of their doomed existence but both lived and continued to love.They had reached a stoic understanding of their fate.Their love had transcended marriage and society.Both could lead separate lives,marry someone else,have children and still could go on loving each other till their last breath.

But it always hurt her,she could never reach that spiritual and philosophical plane that he had achieved.She could never imagine life without him.His laugh,his smile,his soft gentle hands,the way he looked in her eyes,his soft,comforting voice and the way he made her feel;like a princess,like only she existed in the world and nothing else.When they were together the world melted in shadows and memories while nothing else mattered.Those moments defined life itself,everything else was a painful blurred memory.She felt alive when she was with him,life began to have a reason of being,she wanted in those moments to live,to breathe and to smile.He changed everything,her mind,her emotions and even her identity.She became someone else,much different from what she had been bought up to be.Her face softened,her voice had vitality and even her stride changed.She felt exuberant to the point of lunacy.He empowered her.He made her complete.

She wanted to die.She wanted to slit her wrists and leave this world forever,a world which refused possibilities of love,a world which was indifferent to her existence.But she never did anything beyond contemplating it in moments of lament,for she knew he would destroy himself.Not merely kill himself but destroy his very life.She would die and leave the world,he would live and die everyday.She lived for him ignorant of the fact that he had precisely the same reasons for living life.Both lived.Both suffered.Each day passed,the sun rose and set,each day she she woke up and wept.He had no answers for she asked no questions.She had been raised by her family,they had fed her,loved her;she couldn't just betray them because her heart belonged to someone else.They owned her life while he owned her heart.Life had no easy answers.She could not risk her parent's shame.She chose them.

Her wedding was a lavish affair.Relatives from far and away were called.Sweets were stuffed in their mouths,pictures clicked,blessings obliged.The bride sat on the mock throne on the stage with her to-be husband.Aunts commented how fair she looked,a detailed observation would have revealed a pale complexion and deathly demeanor.She had stopped thinking;not today but some months earlier when she had conceded to her parent's choice,a well groomed-educated boy of a traditional business family.Her mother had commented that her duty was over and she could now die peacefully while her father had smiled at the poetic exaggerations of his wife.The daughter had not been consulted about her feelings.Assumptions were the order of the day.As she sat frailly on the pseudo-majestic throne,she remembered the day when she had broke him the news of her marriage.He was impassive,he was quiet,he was shattered.Within his mind he always knew that this day would eventually come but the actual finality of the moment paralyzed him.His heart began to painfully coil as she spoke those words,those final words of parting and tender pain.He held her close,whispered words in her ear,looked deeply within those now-wet eyes and walked away.

The auspicious moment as decided by the chuckling,pot-bellied pundit drew closer.Finally it was time and the two walked towards the holy fire that would unite them forever.She walked,matching her partner's stride,numb with realization of the finality.Formless shapes appeared before her eyes and she began her part of the holy rites,dutifully observing each action as she was told.They say your whole life flashes before your very eyes when you die.She was not dying,simply getting married but He flashed before her eyes.His soft caresses,his husky voice,his enveloping frame,all came back to her as she began to encircle the holy fire with a man she barely knew.Each step erased her previous identity,she was no longer a girl,but a woman whose life would now revolve around her husband and unknown spheres of domesticity,not around Him.When all the rites were over and her forehead glistened with perspiration and vermilion,she allowed herself a single tear.No loud wailing and torrent of tears as custom demanded from a newly wed bride but a single tear.It was the final gesture of her love for Him.She walked into the fading night with her husband rightfully clutching her right hand.She glided into a new world,her mind erased of the past and her heart hollow of all emotion for she knew He had left her world forever.